THE FAITHFUL WIFE

There is very prevalent, along the Borders, an opinion that the arms of the town of Selkirk represent an incident which occurred there at the time of the battle of Flodden.  The device, it is well known, consists of a female bearing a child in her arms, seated on a tomb, on which is also placed the Scottish lion.  Antiquaries tell us that this device was adopted in consequence of the melancholy circumstance of the wife of an inhabitant of the town having been found, by a party returning from the battle, lying dead at the place called Ladywood-edge, with a child sucking at her breast.

We have not the slightest wish to disturb this venerable legend.  It commemorates, with striking force, the desolation of one of Scotland’s greatest calamities; and though the device is rudely and coarsely imagined, there is a graphic strength in the conception, which, independently of the truth of the story, recommends it to the lover of the bold and fervid genius of our countrymen.  We must, at same time, be allowed to say that there is another version, and this we intend, shortly, now to lay before the public, without vouching for its superiority of accuracy over its more favoured and cherished brother; and rather, indeed, cautioning the credulous lovers of old legends to be upon their guard, lest Dr. Johnson’s reproof of Richardson be applicable to us, in saying that we have it upon authority.

When recruits were required by King James the Fourth for the invasion of the English territory, which produced the most lamentable of all our defeats, it is well known that great exertions were used in the cause by the town-clerk of Selkirk, whose name was William Brydone, for which King James the Fifth afterwards conferred on him the honour of knighthood.  Many of the inhabitants of Selkirk, fired with the ardour which the chivalric spirit of James infused into the hearts of his people, and with the spirit of emulation which Brydone had the art of exciting among his townsmen, as Borderers, joined the banners of their provost.  Among these was one, Alexander Hume, a shoemaker, a strong stalwart man, bold and energetic in his character, and extremely enthusiastic in the cause of the king.  He was deemed of considerable importance by Brydone, being held the second best man of the hundred citizens who are said to have joined his standard.  When he came among his companions he was uniformly cheered.  They had confidence in his sagacity and prudence, respected his valour, and admired his strength.

If Hume was thus courted by his companions, and urged by Brydone to the dangerous enterprise in which the king, by the wiles and flattery of the French queen, had engaged, he was treated in a very different manner by Margaret, his wife,—­a fine young woman, who, fond to distraction of her husband, was desirous of preventing him from risking his life in a cause which she feared, with prophetic feeling, would bring